steal a march
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steal a march (third-person singular simple present steals a march, present participle stealing a march, simple past stole a march, past participle stolen a march)
- (intransitive, idiomatic) To gain an advantage unobserved.
- 1759 August 1, Horace Walpole, Letter to Sir Horace Mann, page 501:
- Fifty thousand men cannot easily steal a march over the sea.
- 1771, [Tobias Smollett], “To Sir Watkin Phillips, of Jesus College, Oxon.”, in The Expedition of Humphry Clinker […], volume I, London: […] W. Johnston, […]; and B. Collins, […], →OCLC, pages 127–128:
- You muſt knovv, ſhe yeſterday vvanted to ſteal a march of poor Liddy, and vvent to breakfaſt in the Room vvithout any other companion than her dog, in expectation of meeting vvith the Baronet, […]
- 1883, George MacDonald, chapter 67, in Donal Grant:
- He enjoyed the idea of stealing a march on society, and seeing the sons he had left at such a disadvantage behind him, ruffling it, in spite of absurd law, with the foolish best.
- 2023 May 25, David Smith, “Failure to launch: Twitter glitches deal double blow to Elon Musk and Ron DeSantis”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC:
- For [Elon] Musk it looked like an easy win in his effort to make Twitter the public square, especially one that attracts rightwing blowhards and steal a march on Fox News.
- (intransitive, idiomatic) To start early.
- They stole a march by taking non-merchandise inventory on January 2.
- 1905, Jack London, All Gold Canyon:
- In the morning he stole a march on the sun, for he had finished breakfast when its first rays caught him.